Introduction and hypothesis: Self-administered quality of life (QOL) questionnaires provide objective evaluation of an individual's symptoms. The Pelvic Floor Distress Inventory-20 (PFDI-20) and the Pelvic Floor Impact Questionnaire-7 (PFIQ-7) are condition-specific short form questionnaires. There are very few validated QOL questionnaires for women in Africa. The aim of this study was to validate these questionnaires in African women for the Afrikaans and Sesotho languages.
Methods: Patients with pelvic floor disorders completed the questionnaires at baseline, 1 week later and after 6 months. A control group of women not known to have pelvic floor disorders completed the questionnaires at baseline and 1 week later. Psychometric properties tested were internal consistency, reliability, construct validity and responsiveness.
Results: In each language group, 100 control and 100 study participants completed the scheduled rounds. Internal consistency, as measured by the Cronbach's alpha value, was good for the PFDI-20 (0.71-0.89) and the PFIQ-7 (0.81-0.89) for both the Afrikaans-speaking and the Sesotho-speaking patients. The test-retest reliability showed very good intraclass correlation coefficients of 0.89-0.99 across all scales of both questionnaires and in both language groups. The construct validity was confirmed as was the responsiveness to treatment for both questionnaires.
Conclusions: The Afrikaans and Sesotho versions of the PFDI-20 and PFIQ-7 are reliable and valid instruments that can be used in women with pelvic floor disorders speaking these languages.
Keywords: Africa; PFDI-20; PFIQ-7; Questionnaire; Validation.